ExactTarget Integrates Microsoft Dynamics CRM into Social CRM Tool

ExactTarget unveiled CoTweet Social CRM Connector earlier this week at Microsoft Dynamics’ annual Convergence user conference in Atlanta. The new application will enable organizations to integrate conversations that originate in social media with CRM platforms, including Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011.

CoTweet Social CRM Connector will provide new social CRM capabilities for its CoTweet social management application, enabling organizations to convert conversations on social media platforms, such as Facebook and Twitter, into leads or cases within the CRM system.

“The beauty of social media is how it breaks down walls between people and organizations,” said Jesse Engle, general manager of ExactTarget Social Media Lab, in a statement. “By connecting conversations from Facebook, Twitter, and other social networks to CRM platforms, we’re delivering the industry’s first solution to give businesses a complete view of their customers across online, offline, and social channels.”

With CoTweet Social CRM Connector, organizations can capture conversations from social media, directly associate them with a potential or current client’s CRM profile, and then label them as leads or opportunities, giving sales teams new analytics to measure the impact of their social media initiatives. “This will help enterprises significantly extend the benefits of social to sales enablement to better target campaigns, increase product demand, improve client satisfaction, and quantify the true ROI of social media,” Engle said.

According to Scott Roth, senior director of marketing and alliances at ExactTarget, the company aims to create a “single database for users to contain information about all of their subscribers.” “We really started as an email marketing platform for small- and midsized businesses, but during the last three to four years we’ve started to move into the enterprise space as well,” he says. “We also have moved away from the email marketing side and are rounding out to an interactive marketing platform that allows marketers to gauge over four specific channels: email, mobile, social, and sites.”

In addition to partnering with Microsoft, ExactTarget has collaborated with other CRM companies, such as Salesforce.com, to continue offering similar solutions to organizations. According to Roth, ExactTarget is open to additional partnerships in the future as well. “It’s a hot space, and a lot of people are taking advantage of it,” he says. “The more we can partner up with these guys and keep building functionality out of it the better.”

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